Lest the broadcast networks soak up all your attention with their announcements of new series this week, AMC has released a first-look photo peek at the next season of one of TV land's favorite series, "The Walking Dead."

And, fans will be happy to know, it's business as usual in Season 4 as we see Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) walking through a wooded area with a mysterious female walker hot on his trail.

Season 4 of the drama premieres in October, and the cast and crew began production on the new set of 16 episodes on May 6 in Atlanta. Another alum from "The Wire" -- "Wire" star Chad Coleman was front and center as Tyreese in Season 3 and returns for Season 4 -- will join the action next season, as Lawrence Gilliard Jr. (who played D'Angelo Barksdale on "The Wire") joins "The Walking Dead" as Bob Stookey.

Stookey, a character who also appears in the "Walking Dead" comics, is a former military medic who's quite endearing and charming, despite the fact that he's traumatized about things that have happened in his past (both pre- and post- zombie apocalypse). In the comics, however, the character is much older -- he's in his 50s or 60s -- and he is known as the town drunk in the Governor's Woodbury. The TV series' Stookey, like Gilliard, is in his early 40s.

What does this all mean for the action in Season 4? Is Stookey among the Woodbury residents Rick welcomed into the prison in the Season 3 finale? No one's saying much yet, but October suddenly seems too far away.